DETROIT — Cade Cunningham and Paolo Banchero met again in Game 5 of the Pistons-Magic first-round series on Wednesday night, and both delivered the kind of postseason night that explains why this matchup has drawn so much attention. Cunningham scored 27 points in the first half, 20 of them in a second quarter that bent the game toward Detroit, while Banchero answered with 22 points in the opening 24 minutes for Orlando.
The numbers mattered because this series has been watched as a duel between two young scorers who are already carrying heavy loads. Cunningham, 24, was selected as an All-Star Game starter for the first time and is set to turn 25 on Sept. 25. Banchero, 23, fell just short of an All-Star berth but has continued to post numbers in line with his career averages while anchoring an Orlando roster that was stripped by injuries through the season. For a playoff series that had seen both players' efficiency fade under the postseason spotlight before Game 5, Wednesday brought the kind of shot-making that felt overdue.
Cunningham's path to this point has been shaped by more than the scoreboard. He suffered a collapsed lung in a March 17 matchup with the Wizards, then missed the 65-game mark required to qualify for NBA awards. An injury exemption will still allow him to collect MVP votes and what should be a likely spot on the All-NBA first team, a rare wrinkle in a season that has already produced a first-time All-Star starter and now a major playoff moment. Banchero, meanwhile, will turn 24 on Nov. 12 and has spent much of the year keeping Orlando upright through the injuries that cut into the roster around him.
That is what gives this series its edge. It is not just Pistons against Magic, but Cunningham against Banchero, with each game adding a little more weight to the case that both are already the center of their franchises. Wednesday night did not settle that argument. It sharpened it.
